Vivarium (2017) Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Overview
• Winning the Game - Fitness
• Setup
  • Player Setup
  • Board Setup
  • Event Cards Setup
  • Behaviour Deck Setup
  • Example Setup (4 Player)
• Developing Your Species Nature
  • Behaviour Cards
  • Utility of Behaviour Cards
• Event Cards
• Battle Cards
• Turn Overview
  • Phases of a Turn
• Event Phase
• Survival Phase
• Recovery Phase
• End of Game
• Species Board Abilities
• Special Abilities Explanation
  • Reproduction
  • Movement
  • Extra Movement
• Battle Explanation
• Battle Example
• Glossary

Components

• 22 Board Tiles: 1 Oasis Tile, 13 Normal Tiles, 8 Starting Tiles
• 8 Species Boards
• 164 playing tokens: 18 Anaconda Tokens, 18 Eagle Tokens, 18 Tiger Tokens, 4 Eyrie Tokens, 18 Crocodile Tokens, 17 Gorilla Tokens, 18 Bear Tokens, 1 Silverback Token, 18 Human Tokens, 15 Wolf Tokens, 3 Shelter Tokens, 4 Learning Tokens, 3 Alpha Wolf Tokens, 9 Event Tokens
• 188 Cards: 80 Behaviour Cards, 80 Starter Cards, 20 Event Cards, 8 Battle Cards
• 1 Initiative Token
• 1 Season Dial
• 10 Storage bags

Overview

In Vivarium, you assume the role of 1 of 8 species seeking to start a new life within a new environment. Initially you are equipped only with the instincts and fears you brought into the vivarium. By exploring the new environment you can acquire new behaviours, reproduce, claim territory and utilize your unique characteristics in order to increase your fitness.

Vivarium is played over 4 years and each year contains 4 distinct seasons for your species to thrive or struggle in. At the end of the 4 years, the player with the most Fitness has demonstrated that their species is most suited to survival in this new environment and is declared the winner.

Winning the Game - Fitness

There are multiple ways to increase the Fitness of your species and demonstrate that you are the most suited to survive:

• Defeating another species in battle lets you steal 2 Fitness from another player if they have points to give.
• Completing an objective on an Event Card grants you a varied amount of Fitness depending on the objective.
• Every time you gain a Behaviour card from the line up you gain 1 Fitness.
• Controlling the Oasis Territory at the start of your turn grants you 2 Fitness.

At the end of the game, the player with the most Fitness is declared the winner!

Setup

Player Setup

Each player selects a species to play. Take the species board, the tokens, the combat card and the Instinct and Fear cards associated with your species and place them in front of you. Shuffle your 7 Instinct and 3 Fear cards together to make a deck of 10 cards, place this deck near your player board. Place two animals of your species in your allocated starting section (the red outlined section) on the board once it is set up.

Board Setup

Draw starting tiles (the tiles with the red outlined section) equal to the amount of players and assign one to each player. Put any remaining starting tiles back in the box. Find the Oasis tile (the tile with the palm tree section in the middle) and place it in the middle of the playing space. Mix up the remaining 13 normal tiles and draw the amount needed to construct the following boards based on the amount of players present. (Layouts are shown as diagrams for 2, 3, 4 and 5 players.)

Event Cards Setup

Shuffle the 5 summer Event cards and then deal 4 of them face down, placing the remaining card back in the box without looking at it. Repeat this process with the 5 autumn, 5 winter and 5 spring Event cards to make 4 different event decks of 4 cards. Place them next to each other in that order (summer, autumn, winter, spring). Position the Event cards and the den, African dog, hippo and antelope tokens within reach.

Behaviour Deck Setup

Shuffle the Behaviour deck of 80 cards and place it within reach of all players. Reveal the top 5 cards of the Behaviour deck to create a line up to acquire cards from. You're ready to try your hand at Vivarium!

The player who last saw a non-human animal is the starting player. Give the starting player the season dial and the initiative marker. Set the season dial to summer.

Example Setup (4 Player)

1. Species Board
2. Species Tokens
3. Battle Card
4. Starter Cards in Deck
5. Behaviour Deck
6. Behaviour Card Line Up
7. Map Tiles
8. Event Cards
9. Event Tokens

Developing Your Species Nature

Vivarium utilises a unique system of dynamic deck building where you will collect cards in order to adapt your species nature in order to survive. Initially your species is in a new environment with only their instincts and their fears to help or harm them.

The core of the game is playing cards to accrue Energy and then spending this Energy over the turns to buy more cards and perform various actions. By purchasing stronger cards you allow yourself to produce more and more Energy which in turn opens up more actions for you to perform. Initially, this is represented by having a deck made up of 10 starter cards, 7 Instinct and 3 Fear. At the beginning of the game you shuffle these 10 cards to form your starting deck and draw 5 cards from it. This deck represents the nature of your species and is developed through the game to become stronger and more efficient. During the Survival Phase on your turn, you may play cards from your hand. Initially, Instinct cards give you just 1 Energy and Fear cards give you nothing. However, throughout the course of the game, you will have the opportunity to acquire new behaviours (cards) in order to increase the Fitness of your species.

Behaviour Cards

In Vivarium there are 4 types of Behaviour cards which you can acquire:

1. Population - Related to adding more animals to the board.
2. Aggression - Related to disrupting your opponents.
3. Ingenuity - Related to drawing more cards or destroying cards.
4. Territory - Related to moving your animals further and faster through the environment.

Each behaviour card has:

1. A title at the top of the card.
2. A cost at the top left.
3. The amount of Energy a card gives you when played in the bottom right.
4. An ability the card can give you when played in the bottom middle.

Utility of Behaviour Cards

Instinct and Behaviour cards are played at the beginning of the Survival Phase. To do this simply place the cards you want to play in front of you in the order you want to play them. Then resolve the cards from left to right. First you gain any Energy bonuses listed on the bottom right of the cards. You always get Energy from Behaviour cards, but you will only get their abilities if you play a card of the same type. For example, if you have 3 Ingenuity cards in your hand you can play all three and receive Energy from all of them. However, you will only receive the abilities of the last two Ingenuity cards you play. The first card's ability is sacrificed in order to activate the remaining cards.

Similarly, if you have two Territory cards and two Population cards in your hand you can receive Energy from all of them, but only activate the abilities of 1 Territory and 1 Population card.

In essence, it costs the ability of one Behaviour card to activate the abilities of any following Behaviour cards that share a type.

Event Cards

Event cards are revealed at the beginning of the player holding the initiative token's turn. Each Event card has the following:

1. A title at the top of the card.
2. The seasonal effect below the title.
3. A text box at the bottom of the card with the condition that needs to be fulfilled to complete this card.
4. The amount of Fitness you'll gain by completing this Event card's condition.

Battle Cards

Battle cards provide a special ability to help your species claim and defend Territory. It also provides the information needed to conduct battle. Each Battle card has the following:

1. An identifier telling you which species the card belongs to.
2. That species ability which is only used at the beginning of a battle.
3. A column tracking how many animals are in the battle.
4. A column tracking how much Pressure your animals have in the battle.
5. A column tracking how much Persistence your animals have in the battle.

Note: To see how much Pressure and Persistence you have simply find how many animals you have and then follow that row from left to right.

Turn Overview

Play begins with the starting player taking a turn, then proceeds clockwise to the next player. When play returns to the starting player, the initiative marker moves clockwise to the next player. The initiative marker determines when events occur. The season always changes at the beginning of the starting player's turn but the Event card is only revealed at the start of the player holding the initiative token's turn. This way every player has a turn in each season but the events will occur at varying points during each season based on which player holds the initiative marker.

Phases of a Turn

Each turn is divided into 3 phases, each with distinct steps. Resolve each phase and step in order. During the Event Phase there are 2 steps that will only occur if it is the starting player's turn and 1 step that will only occur if it is the player holding the initiative marker's turn, ignore these steps if these conditions are not met and move to the next relevant step.

1. Event Phase

• 1a. If it is the starting player's turn, move the initiative marker clockwise one space to the next player.
• 1b. If it is the starting player's turn, turn the season dial to the next season.
• 1c. If it is the player holding the initiative marker's turn reveal the top Event card of the appropriate season and resolve its ability. This card is left in play until the objective is complete.
• 1d. All players deploy any Mature animals waiting to be deployed into a Territory they control or their starting Territory unless otherwise specified.
• 1e. The current player resolves any abilities that activate at the start of the turn, such as extra movements and detrimental abilities.

2. Survival Phase

• 2a. The current player plays any cards they wish to this turn and gains Energy from each card played as well as activating any abilities.
• 2b. Players do not have to play all their cards and can hold cards for future turns, but must play any cards they want to in this step.
• 2c. Place any played cards into your discard pile and adjust your Energy dial to represent your current Energy stores.
• 2d. The current player may now spend Energy on activating abilities on their species board, movement and buying Behaviour cards. Any purchased Behaviour cards are placed into your discard pile.

3. Recovery Phase

• 3a. The current player may resolve any end of turn abilities such as extra movement.
• 3b. If any of your animals occupy the same Territory as another species, battle is now resolved. See page 16.
• 3c. Refill the line up with Behaviour cards until there are 6 cards in it. If there is 6 or more cards in the line up then do not add more to it.
• 3d. The current player draws cards from their deck until they have 5 cards in their hand. If there are not enough cards left in their deck they shuffle their discard pile to create a new deck and draw up to 5 cards from this new deck.

Event Phase

The Event Phase has a varied length depending on whose turn it is.

If it is the starting player's turn they must move the initiative marker clockwise one space and turn the season dial to the next season.

If it is the player now holding the initiative marker's turn then a seasonal event occurs. At this point the top card of the appropriate season deck is revealed and resolved.

For example, if the season dial shows that it is autumn and your turn begins while you control the initiative marker, the top card of the autumn deck is revealed and resolved before moving to the next step. Underneath the title of the Event card will be the seasonal effect to resolve and at the bottom of the card there will be an objective to complete. The revealed Event card is left in play until a player fulfils its objective.

In order to claim an Event card, a player must simply meet the requirements of the objective on that card. The first player to do so gains Fitness as dictated by the Fitness symbol at the bottom of the card and then places that card next to their player board. Afterwards any abilities that activate at the start of the turn are resolved now before progressing to the Survival Phase.

Some Event cards have special rules and place tokens onto the board, they are explained below:

Livelihood - This card places the den token into the Forest Territory on the outside of the Oasis tile. The first player to control the Territory with the den in it and activate their reproductive ability claims it. Once this happens, remove the den token from the board.

Famine - This card places the hippopotamus token into the Oasis Territory. If there is a player there, that player must remove an animal they control from the Oasis and move any remaining animals out of the Oasis and into an adjacent Territory of their choice. If they choose to move into a Territory with another player in it, then resolve the battle immediately.

To complete this objective you must defeat the hippopotamus in battle as you would with another player. The hippopotamus has 12 Pressure and Persistence and its token is removed from the board once the objective is claimed.

Pursuit - This card places the antelope token into the Grassland Territory on the outside of the Oasis tile and the first person to capture it claims this card. In order to capture the antelope a player must move into the same Territory as the antelope and flip one of their animal tokens as if it was a coin. If it lands on the active side then the antelope is captured and the token removed from the board. If it lands on the resting side then the antelope runs into the closest unoccupied Grassland Territory. If the antelope is deployed into an occupied Territory that player immediately flips one of their tokens to see if they capture it or not.

Resourceful - This card places 6 African wild dogs into the Wasteland Territory on the outside of the Oasis tile and in order to defeat them you must battle them as normal. Each dog has 2 Pressure and 2 Persistence and if they are deployed into an occupied Territory battle ensues immediately. If the battle is lost, but a number of dogs have been defeated, the remaining dogs in the pack are left in that Territory and another player can move in to battle them and claim the Event card.

Note: Usually it is free to move into a Territory occupied by another player because your territorial instincts motivate you to attack, this rule extends to moving into the same Territory as the hippopotamus and the African wild dogs but this rule does not apply to moving into the same Territory as the antelope token.

Survival Phase

The Survival Phase has two parts and is where you will make the decisions that guide your species to or away from survival.

The first part is playing Behaviour cards for their Energy and abilities. After playing cards you adjust your Energy dial to represent how much Energy you have, resolve any activated abilities and then place all played cards into your discard pile.

The second part is a lot more fluid and will differ every turn. During this part you may pay Energy to perform a number of actions such as: buying Behaviour cards from the line up, moving your animals around the board and activating abilities listed on your player board. These actions are explained further on page 14.

Pay the appropriate amount of Energy by adjusting your Energy dial.

Recovery Phase

Once you are done taking actions any end of turn abilities are activated and resolved. Then check to see whether any animals you control occupy the same Territory as another player's animals. If they do, resolve a battle for each occurrence and then move to the next step. Resolving a battle is detailed on page 16.

At this point the line up is refilled if it has less than 6 cards in it. Once all battles are resolved, draw a new hand of 5 cards. If you are unable to draw a full hand of 5 cards, you draw as many cards as possible and then shuffle your discard pile to form a new deck and draw up to a hand of 5. Play then proceeds to the next player.

Note: When play proceeds back to the starting player, a new season starts and the initiative marker moves around the table.

End of Game

Vivarium ends when the last player finishes their turn in spring of the 4th year. The player with the most Fitness has guided their species to the highest chance of survival and is declared the winner. If there is a tie, the player who completed the most objectives wins. If there is still a tie, then all tied players are declared winners.

Species Board Abilities

Your species board is your base of operations, it contains all the information needed to activate abilities, move through Territories and reproduce. It also has 2 dials, one for Fitness and one for Energy. Adjust the Fitness dial whenever you gain or lose Fitness. Adjust the Energy dial when you gain or lose Energy. This will usually happen in the Survival Phase when you play cards and then take actions.

Your species board will have a list of abilities unique to your animal that you will use to vie for survival during the game. Each species has one Population ability, one Territory ability, one Ingenuity ability, one Instinct ability and one Aggression ability.

Your Population ability is the most important ability your species possesses. You will need this ability to create more animals, expand your population and to complete objectives. In order to reproduce, you must activate your Population ability by paying the appropriate amount of Energy in the appropriate season and completing any action required. Each animal reproduces in a certain season of the year, and each animal deploys its young in a certain season of the year. Reproduction is described in detail on page 15.

Your Territory ability will usually allow your animal to move further and faster throughout the environment when fulfilling certain conditions. Movement is described in detail on page 15.

Your Ingenuity ability is some trait that your species possesses that you can utilize to further your chances of survival. Often, these abilities will require an energy cost and you may activate them at any point in the Action Phase.

Your Instinct ability is usually a restriction or weakness that your species possesses that you need to manage or overcome.

Special Abilities Explanation

Reproduction

The more animals you have, the more likely you are to survive. Unfortunately, the laws of nature dictate when and how your species reproduces. Each species will have a reproductive ability that can usually only be activated once a year in the appropriate season. To do so, you must pay the appropriate amount of Energy and then resolve the ability. Once this ability is resolved place the appropriate amount of animals from your reserve pool onto your species board. On your species board there is 4 symbols to represent the 4 seasons, stack your animals on the season where they will eventually be deployed. Here they will develop and wait for deployment in the appropriate season. This is called Maturing animals. Once the season your animal deploys in starts, you may deploy these new animals in any Territory you control, any Territory dictated by an ability or in your starting Territory. While activating your reproductive ability is the main way to increase your population, you can utilize Population cards from the line up to help create more animals. Some Population cards enable you to automatically Mature animals to be deployed in the following season.

Note: You can activate your reproductive ability as many times as you want/is possible as long as it is your breeding season. It's sometimes a good idea to save up for your reproductive season!

Movement

In Vivarium you need to progress your species and move around the board in order to complete Event cards and increase your overall Fitness. Each animal you control has 1 movement point on each turn that they can use to move to an adjacent Territory. This Movement point is inherent and is not listed as an ability on your species board. However, upon moving you must check to see how much Energy it costs to move into that type of Territory and pay the appropriate amount. If you do not have enough Energy for this movement, then you cannot move. Some species thrive in certain types of Territory and consequently they do not have to pay excess Energy to move into those types of Territory, this does however use their movement point.

If you want to move into a Territory occupied by another player your Territorial instincts take over and you do not need to pay Energy to move into that Territory. If you move into a Territory occupied by another player turn all moved animals to their resting side. These animals cannot move further this turn and a battle will ensue after the Survival phase.

It is important to note that the map for Vivarium will be different every time and that a Territory is classified not by individual hexes, but by types. A Territory's boundaries are determined by other neighbouring Territories. As such, it's possible to have a single Territory stretch across multiple tiles if Territories of the same type connect.

In Vivarium there are 8 different types of territories: Starter, Forest, Mountain, Wasteland, Oasis, Swamp, Plains, River. Each animal interacts with them differently except for the Oasis. You do not need to spend energy to move into the Oasis or your Starting Territory but it will still use your Movement point for the turn. Other players may never enter your Starting Territory.

Extra Movement

Each species will have an ability on your species board that will enable you to move further. This ability generally gives you an extra, free movement to move one extra Territory if and only if you meet the criteria listed on your species board. These extra movements are generally done only at the end of the Event Phase and the start of the Recovery Phase.

Certain Behaviour cards grant you with free movement that can be used in conjunction with your normal movement and extra movement. Once you have used your animals' movement point you can flip that animal's token over to its resting side to help you keep track of which animals are done moving. At the beginning of your next turn your animals get their movement point back and can be flipped back to their active side to represent this.

Battle Explanation

In Vivarium each species is seeking to carve out their own niche in this new environment and this requires the control of Territory. Each species is said to exert Pressure upon a Territory based upon the amount of animals in that Territory. In a battle, the player that exerts the most Pressure will generally be more successful in defending or claiming Territory. Persistence represents a species endurance within a Territory and determines the amount of Pressure you can endure from opponents before removing animals from the board.

If you move 1 or more animals into a Territory occupied by another player's animals turn them to their resting side and resolve battle during the Recovery Phase. If you moved into your opponent's Territory you are called the Aggressor and your opponent is the Defender.

Your Aggression ability is a way for your animal to defend itself that you only use when battling another species. These abilities are quite varied and generally take effect just before a battle begins. This ability is found on your Battle card.

Battle is resolved through a number of steps as follows:

1. Each player looks at their Battle Card and checks how much Pressure and Persistence they have based on the amount of animals they are attacking or defending with.
2. The Aggressor announces and applies their Battle Ability if it is being used.
   • 2.a. The Defender may then do the same.
3. At this point Pressure and Persistence value is compared.

The player with the highest Pressure is labelled as the Fight player. The player with the lowest Pressure is labelled the Flight player. In the case of a tie, the Aggressor is granted Fight and the Defender is granted Flight.

5. Each player then subtracts their Pressure value from their opponent's Persistence value. Players then adjust the amount of animals they have in this battle based on this new Persistence value.
6. If the remaining Persistence value is 0 or less for a species then all animals of that species in the battle are returned to that player's reserve pool and the remaining player is the winner. If both players' Persistence value is reduced to 0 or below, then all animals are returned to their reserve pools and no one wins. If both players still have animals in the battle, then the Flight player retreats to an adjacent Territory of their choice and the Fight player is declared the winner.

Note: When determining how many animals to remove from the board during a battle, the Pressure must exceed a single animal's worth of Persistence, otherwise it survives. So if 3 Pressure is enacted upon a wolf with 4 Persistence, it will remain on the board.

Note: If you win a battle, you take two Fitness from the player you defeated. If that player had no Fitness, you do not get any.

Note: If for some reason your species is completely removed from the board, perhaps due to a battle, then you simply place 2 animals of your species back at your starting tile and continue to play as usual.

Battle Example

Example 1. The wolf player is attacking the bear player with 5 wolves. The bear player is defending with 2 bears.

The wolf player is called the Aggressor and the bear player is called the Defender. Each player checks how much Pressure and Persistence they have by finding the row related to how many animals they have in the battle. In this case the wolves have 15 Pressure and 20 Persistence. The bears have 12 Pressure and 16 Persistence.

Next the Aggressor may activate their battle ability or pass. The Defender then does the same. In this case the wolf player discards a card from their hand to increase their Pressure by 5. So they now have 20 Pressure. However, the bears ability reduces the wolves' Pressure by 3. Leaving the wolves with 17 Pressure.

Once battle abilities are resolved both players compare their Pressure against their opponent's Persistence. In this case the wolves' Pressure exceeds the bear's Persistence, meaning both bear tokens are removed from the board. The bear's Pressure is 12. 20 minus 12 is 8, which means 2 wolves survive, 3 are removed from the board. The wolves win the battle and move into the Territory the bears occupied. The wolves steal 2 Fitness from the bears if possible.

Example 2. In this example, 2 wolves are attacking 2 tigers.

The wolves start with 6 Pressure and 8 Persistence, the tigers start with 14 Pressure and 6 Persistence. The wolves activate their ability by discarding a card taking them to 8 Pressure. The tigers activate their ability so their Pressure is now 6 and their Persistence is now 14. The wolves are titled Fight because their Pressure is higher and the tigers are titled Flight. Both players then compare their Pressure with their opponent's Persistence. The wolves have 8 Pressure which exceeds the 7 Persistence of 1 tiger so a tiger token is removed from the board. The tigers have 6 Pressure which exceeds the Persistence of 1 wolf so a wolf token is removed from the board. Both players have 1 token remaining, but the wolves are the Fight player and thus they win the combat. The tiger retreats to an adjacent Territory immediately, the wolf moves into the now vacated Territory and 2 Fitness is stolen from the tiger player if possible.

Glossary

• Aggression cards - Are a type of Behaviour card that often disrupts your opponents.
• Aggressor - Is the attacking player in a battle.
• Battle - Occurs when 2 players occupy the same Territory with any number of their animals and is a way of resolving the ownership of the Territory and for stealing Fitness from other players.
• Battle ability - Is a unique ability on your Battle card that you can utilise in a battle.
• Battle cards - Are unique cards that display your species Pressure and Persistence values along with its battle ability.
• Behaviour cards - Are cards you can acquire to improve your species nature and are purchasable from the Behaviour card line-up.
• Deck - In the beginning of the game this is your Instinct and Fears cards and becomes the accumulation of Behaviour cards you have acquired. It sits next to your player board.
• Defender - Is the defending player in a battle.
• Deploy - Is the act of placing Mature animals onto the board.
• Discard pile - Is a pile of cards that is filled with cards you have acquired, discarded and used. When your deck is empty the discard pile is shuffled and becomes your deck.
• Energy - The resource you acquire throughout the game in order to take actions and increase your species Fitness.